Greta Thunberg Wants Us To Kill The Poor
I stand against modern day environmental activism. This is roughly a year too late, but I have decided to discuss the current figurehead of the anti-climate-change movement, particularly amongst the youth of today, Greta Thunberg. When I look at the package deal that she has been promoting, I generally find myself in part in agreeing with her and in part scared and alarmed by her, because her views are not based on facts and are a concerning blend of edifying action and toxic ideology.
Greta is evidently a precocious youth, having developed a concern for these matters at an earlier age than is usual or expected. We should not simply dismiss her by attempting to try to tell ourselves that she is too young for this. She is exhibiting qualities that compensate for her shortcomings that the overwhelming majority of people her age, myself included, and even most adults lack: a doer mentality, media savvy, and courage. We can hardly celebrate Beethoven for being a child prodigy and then slander, libel, harass, dump on, or otherwise malign Greta because she just so happens to promote a message that we may very well not agree with. And yet, she has thrown her hat into the ring and now I must respond in kind, for her message is fundamentally wrong. Having taken up what is and - in spite of her input - should continue to be an adult subject (and I do recognise the inherent irony of my speaking on the subject) she deserves an adult response.
Ok, we should begin by recognising that there is absolutely nothing new in her message, neither the bad bits nor the good parts.
Let us, first of all, get one thing out of the way: I agree with her on the fact that climate change is an issue that is so serious that humanity will soon face an existential crisis, that global warming, if nothing is done about it, might, to use her own words, “lead to the end of our civilization as we know it.” I generally reject hysteria, falsifications and idiocy by certain types of climate activists, and the factual, and yet overblown and alarmist publications peddled by some organisations that I would otherwise consider reputable, however, the fundamental premise of climate change is true (likely 1.5 degrees of anthropological warming) and is problematic for humans. Anyhow, when one examines her speeches and writings, we can see that she is, on the causes of global warming, certainly no less informed than any other run-of-the-mill, well-read and concerned citizen.
Not least, Ms Thunberg has rightly calling out many adults and world leaders for neglecting to address the single most existential, long term, threat humanity faces.
However, I am convinced that her vision of what solving the problem of climate change amounts to, is deranged and pathological at best. Her views, carefully considered, are problematic. From the way that she approaches the problem, it is clear that she has an entirely insufficient grasp on some facts, and of the logical consequences of ideas.
It is Ms Greta Thunberg’s stance that we should act immediately. This is essentially the most fundamental tenet to her philosophy of action directe. In theory, I endorse that view. The problem of greenhouse gas emissions must be resolved; otherwise human civilisation will cease to continue in any meaningful sense of the word. I continue to agree to that point. However, it seems as if Ms Thunberg either does not see or does not accept science and technology as the most important means for solving the climate problem.
Miss Thunberg has largely desisted from advocating specific solutions. She is for all intents and purposes promoting action and problem-solving that at a deeper level dismisses reliance on technology. To quote her from her speech at the ‘Brilliant Minds’ conference:
“To acknowledge that we don’t have all the solutions to the climate and ecological crises yet, unless those solutions mean that we simply stop doing certain things. We need to accept that the market and new technologies will not solve everything for us… At meetings like these you love to listen to entrepreneurs, new ideas and new inventions. But when it comes to the climate crisis the time for those magic new inventions has just about come and gone.”
To be fair to Miss Thunberg, there is in part a valid basis for critiquing the technological approach. She appears to be aware of the fact that many of the technological ‘solutions’ being bandied about are in fact not yet ready and available. To quote her:
“And please note that these calculations (for achieving reductions of CO2 emissions) are depending on inventions that have not yet been invented at scale.”
These are essentially general and important allusions to the problems with intermittency with regards to renewable energy, carbon sequestration, and negative-emissions technologies. Clever girl! So far, so good. However, if technology is not the solution, what then must we do, according to Ms Thunberg?
To quote her again from her speech at the Brilliant Minds conference:
“We need to start living within the planetary boundaries. This will be a drastic change for many, but not for most. Because most of the world’s population is already living within the planetary boundaries. It is a minority who are not.”
But, you may ask, what exactly does ‘living with the planetary boundaries’ mean to her?
The fact of the matter is that she answers that question, with most disturbing implications. The minority she is referring to are wealthy Westerners. The majority (‘most of the world’s population’) she is referring to are the individuals in the poor countries. She is essentially saying that people in the poor countries are ‘already living within the planetary boundaries.’ To quote her:
“It is not people in countries like Mozambique, Bangladesh or Colombia who are most responsible for this crisis. It is mostly down to people like you here in the audience. Entrepreneurs, celebrities, politicians, business leaders. People who have a lot of power. People who consume enormous amounts of stuff. Who often fly around the world, sometimes in private jets. Your individual carbon footprints are in some cases the equivalent of whole villages. But the worst part I think is that you are normalizing this extreme lifestyle. Because people look up to you. You are the role models, you are setting the standards. People aspire to be like you.”
Think carefully about that; consider it: she is not mentioning any Western country as a model for ‘living within the planetary boundaries.’ Not a single one. No, it’s Mozambique, Bangladesh or Colombia, period.
Words have meaning. If you are using Mozambique and Bangladesh as examples of places where people are ‘already living within the planetary boundaries’ while telling people who are far richer that they ‘need to start living within the planetary boundaries’ you shouldn’t be surprised that this could be interpreted as making the case that we of the rich countries might have to revert to the living standards of Mozambique, Bangladesh or Colombia.
How appalling! Her solution requires the abandonment of the ideal of universal prosperity for people everywhere on Earth. What an incredibly fatuous notion! Ms Thunberg, has implicitly but irrefutably made it clear that she wants a massive reduction in the living standards of people in rich countries while stopping poor countries from raising the living standards of their populations. Thunberg should know better, and yet, we can see further examples of her views in a famous quote where she unfortunately mocks the idea of economic growth as a "fairytale." But for people in the developing world, money and economic growth — two things Thunberg apparently thinks are contemptible — translate into a longer and better life. In other words, economic development means happiness for regular people, since, as Ludwig von Mises pointed out, "Most mothers feel happier if their children survive, and most people feel happier without tuberculosis than with it."
Thunberg's blithe disregard for the benefits of economic growth is, sadly, endemic for people from wealthy countries who are already living in an industrialized world built by the fossil fuels of yesteryear. These contemptibly ‘elite’ suburbanites who support Greta Thunberg associate additional economic growth with access to haute couture and exotic luxury cars. But for the billions of human beings living outside these places, fossil-fuel-driven industrialization is literally the difference between life and death.
And yet, Greta Thunberg has seen fit to abate countries like Brazil and Turkey for not more enthusiastically cutting off their primary means to quickly deliver a more sanitary, more well-fed, and less deadly way of life for ordinary people.
If economic growth is stifled by climate policy and a hundred million people lose out on clean water and safe housing as a result, that's a pretty big cost. After all, the benefits of cheap energy — most of which provided by fossil fuels — are already apparent. Life expectancy continues to climb, and is expected to keep making the biggest gains in the developing world. Child and infant mortality continues to go down. For the first time in history, the average Chinese peasant isn't forced to scratch out a subsistence-level existence on a rice paddy or die. Thanks to cheap electricity, women in middle income countries don't have to spend their days cleaning clothes by hands without washing machines. Children don't have to drink cholera-tainted water. It is incredibly easy to sit before a group of wealthy politicians and say "How dare you?" for not implementing one's desired climate policy. It might be slightly harder to tell a Bangladeshi T-shirt factory worker that she's had it too good, and we need to put the brakes on economic growth.
For her own good, of course.
If economies don’t grow, what do the growing populations in developing countries eat?
Back onto the idea of living within global boundaries, Ms Thunberg apparently wants to return us to a world of medieval values, namely, when poverty was the measure of virtue. That is what this practically offhand reference to ‘most of the world’s population already living within the planetary boundaries’ means. . She has idiotically declined bothering with thoughts of the consequences of ‘living within the planetary boundaries’. She does not spend one single word on what ‘living with the planetary boundaries’ has throughout history meant for humanity: hunger, famine, malnutrition, unsafe drinking water, stunted growth, disease, high child mortality, low life expectancy, all problems that countries solve by promoting economic growth. I repeat myself, but I cannot stress this point enough.
This is most probably not how she intended to be understood, but it is the logical conclusion that we should be allowed to draw from her own words.
There is a deep irony involved in her agnostic approach to technology. Clearly, she does not expect that any form of technology will save us. However, the point of her movement and her writings and speeches is that she wants immediate action, which is precisely what nuclear energy makes possible. To be fair to her, it deserves to be pointed out that had she chosen to advocate for nuclear energy she may never have achieved global fame. It is likely that the antinuclear environmentalists would have squashed her protest movement at its moment of conception.
Fundamentally, the whole point of science, technology, and economic growth has been to escape the tyranny and misery of scarcity. Dismissing it’s likely success and telling us to ‘live within planetary boundaries’ is to tell us that we should all accept the horror of living as the poor still do in Africa and India. This is unacceptable.
In the final analysis, Greta’s message force-feeds us the all-too-familiar dark green propaganda. Dark green environmentalism is essentially anti-growth, anti-industrial, anti-prosperity, anti-technology, and anti-capitalist. The world they have in mind for us is one in which the rich world must accept what is in effect impoverishment and in which the poor world must abandon the joyous promise of prosperity and the dignity that prosperity brings.
Accordingly, her contribution to the debate on global warming is been negative rather than positive.
Miss Thunberg, please learn to understand that there is a world of meaning and consequences, often unintended, in ideal, ideas, and messages, which must be evaluated critically in terms of their logical consequence. I am sure she means well. She, on the other hand, needs learn that messages, ideals, and ideas that sound splendidly virtuous and high-minded can be extremely dangerous. What are the consequences of this beyond Miss Thunberg herself? A generation of self-hating suburbanites have become toxic ideologues, who have adopted the inherently unsavoury aspects of Greta’s ideology, and are advocating for policies that will kill. When Brazil or India accelerate so that it’s citizens can get a sliver of the lifestyle that we enjoy, we should not be quick to condemn. Advocating for the continued poverty of a Brazilian mineworker, or a Bangladeshi factory worker is not admirable.
Greta Thunberg is a symptom of a toxic worldview. Unfortunately, admirable intentions do not necessarily lead to admirable logical conclusions. I oppose this; you should too.
